1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a pyrrolotriazole compound having a specific structure, and relates to a silver halide color photosensitive material having its color reproduction and color image durability enhanced, having its staining in various forms inhibited and having its processing stability enhanced by the use of a cyan coupler of the pyrrolotriazole compound.
2. Description of the Related Art
With respect to silver halide color photosensitive materials, it is well known that an oxidized aromatic primary amine color developing agent, which uses exposed silver halides as an oxidizer, reacts with a coupler to thereby produce dyes of indophenol, indoaniline, indamine, azomethine, phenoxazine, phenazine, etc. leading to image formation. In this system of photography, use is made of the subtractive color process, and color images are formed by yellow, magenta and cyan dyes.
In the formation of cyan dye images among these, a phenol-type or naphthol-type coupler is commonly employed. However, the dyes formed from these couplers exhibit undesirable absorption in the yellow to magenta region, thereby posing a problem of deterioration of color reproduction. Therefore, it is demanded to resolve this problem.
Especially in recent years, demands on the system in which image information is digitized and subjected to image processing, and thereafter the image information is exposed to a silver halide color photosensitive material, known as the digital photography, are increasing. Particularly in this system, there is a strong demand for a silver halide color photosensitive material of large color reproduction range wherein formed dyes do not exhibit the above undesirable absorption.
On the other hand, high saturation and large color reproduction range are demanded on reversal films. Since the method of emphasizing an interlayer effect has a drawback of, for example, deterioration in processing dependence, it is demanded to realize the high saturation and large color reproduction range by the use of a coupler of excellent hue.
As means for solving this problem, there have been proposed heterocyclic compounds as described in, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,728,598 and 4,873,183 and EP 0249453A2. However, the couplers described therein have fatal drawbacks such as low coupling activity and poor dye durability.
As a coupler which overcomes these problems, there have been proposed pyrrolotriazole couplers as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,256,526 and EP 0545300. It has been revealed that these couplers, although being excellent in hue and coupling activity, need further improvement because color photosensitive materials wherein these couplers are employed are not satisfactory in color image durability. Further, the pyrrolotriazole couplers pose such a problem that at bleach-fix processing, the color formation efficiency is lowered by conversion of dyes to leuco compounds (discoloring of some dyes by reduction), the problem known as the blix color fading. Still further, the couplers pose a problem of cyan staining in various forms. Still further, the conventional pyrrolotriazole cyan couplers have a drawback in that when processed with the use of formalin, the photosensitive material containing the couplers suffer magenta staining upon aging.
Moreover, shortening of processing steps and reduction of replenishment rate are demanded on the color reversal films. The inventors have conducted investigations, and as a result it has been found that there is such a problem that the maximum density drop of cyan is inevitably increased when reduction of replenishment rate has been carried out for not only the color developer but also the reversal bath. Furthermore, this problem is often aggravated in the use of hitherto proposed pyrrolotriazole couplers as compared with the use of conventional phenol-type cyan couplers. Solving this matter is strongly demanded.